I Remember
by trinchardin
Summary: Spark/Agent Fleming's story (read What Am I? first)...pleaaassseee review, people! and guess what I have two new stories...if only I can find time to type and post them...


Disclaimer: I don't own the Matrix or anyone in it, like Agent Brown. But, I do own Spark and her story.  
  
I know this is looong overdue people but I've been going through an anime fanfiction craze...anyway here's Spark/Agent Fleming's story. This continues from the Alternative Finale, which apparently was more popular than my original one. Please review this people! I live for reviews! And to Zodiac - please, please, pleassseee continue your Agent series! I'm going crazy thinking of what happened to Smith!  
  
I Remember  
  
Sometimes I remember my life before I was an Agent. Before Brown. Before I gave up my ideals and dreams of vengeance for love.  
  
Flashbacks of my former life come to me like parts of a puzzle snapping slowly into place. They haunt me even now when I no longer truly live. I merely exist as an insignificant code in the very system I originally tried to escape. But, it doesn't matter anymore. I crossed the line between what I saw as right and wrong a long time ago...and only to realize that there never was a line in the first place. At least not for me. It was my destiny from the beginning to exist as I do now.  
  
I didn't have much of childhood. My father raised me alone after my mother walked out on us. I was only six, but I remember my mother's shrill, raised voice in contrast to my father's calm, soft one. She said that he was never around when she needed him and that it was time he took responsibility for me. Slamming the front door shut behind her, she left and never came back. I don't know where she went or what happened to her. But, I don't really care. Violent mood swings and a shrill voice. That's all I remember of her.  
  
My father was a military man like every man in his family was. He was always off on some top secret mission, so after my mother left I spent most of my time with the family of my father's friend. I don't remember anything about them except that I hated them for having such close family ties. As for my father, if there was anything I remember about him, it was this - he was a firm believer of discipline and tradition. He raised me to be an obedient daughter and one day an equally obedient wife to a military man. I myself would never go to West Point or Pensacola for women in his family had never been in the military. It was considered improper. That and the fact that he'd wanted a son in the first place made it useless for me to even try to please him. But that knowledge didn't stop me. I did everything I could to gain his approval until I turned twelve.   
  
It was then that I discovered the world of computers. In school, I was never one of the 'cool' group. I was an outcast. One who was always picked last in games. But I didn't mind that. I'd be the first to admit that I was terrible at sports. Anyway, I somehow managed to meet fellow outcasts - misery loves company - who happened to be into computers.   
  
It turned out that I had a natural talent when it came to computers. Finally, I'd found something I was good at. My whole life I'd been hurt and rejected, but in the world of computers, I was safely hidden behind the handle Spark. As a hacker and programmer, I was respected by fellow hackers even before it was known that I could hack into the Pentagon database. I hacked into their database not for the challenge, but due to simple curiousity. I do not remember what I found there, but I do remember that it was then that I began to distance myself from my father.  
  
After that, things went by pretty quickly. Before I knew it, I was fifteen...and on the receiving end of strange phone calls and enigmatic e-mails. No matter how hard I tried I couldn't trace back any of them. But the caller and e-mail sender - I was sure they were one and the same person - was willing to tell me what I wanted to know: What is the Matrix?  
  
It was Merc - short for Mercury - who recruited me. He was only a few years older than I was. When I became one of the crew on board the ship, Hope, it wasn't long before we were close friends. Then, our captain - an energetic woman called Fuse - was killed on a mission just as I was getting to know her.   
  
Her death taught me that that no matter how noble our cause was our mortality was still at risk. We were not invincible heroes. In the Matrix, we were on the System's turf. We still played by their rules even if we could get away with breaking a few of them. And we all knew one simple rule - we died...the enemy didn't. You saw one of them and you ran like hell in the other direction.  
  
After Fuse died, Merc being the second-in-command was made captain. I soon replaced him as second-in-command when I turned seventeen. That's when Zion started to notice my flair for programming. Before I knew it, rumors started circulating that I was the One.  
  
Now that I think of it, I can only laugh. A programmer on any rebel ship today can easily do in an hour what it took me a day to develop. But then things have changed in the years that I've been in a stasis. And who knows, maybe one day man will triumph over machine. Till that day comes...  
  
But, I digress. When Zion discovered my potential to be the One, they quickly sent me off to meet the mysterious Oracle. Not many were sent to see her in those dark days, which could explain my apprehension. She looked exactly the same as she does now...and she still baked those delicious cookies of hers.  
  
Having handed me one to eat that fateful day, she waited for me to finish before she told me the bad news. It was sort of a last meal, I guess. She kept it simple for once. No enigmatic crap for someone who'd 'die' in the next few hours. She told me that I'd 'die' along with my entire crew but that somehow I'd come back. And when I did, I'd betray the Resistance I fought for, yet still manage to redeem myself. She ended it with real bang by nonchalantly adding that I would find love.  
  
Being the skeptic - and stubborn bitch - that I was, I refused to believe her and sarcastically asked if it was going to be a tall, dark, and handsome man who'd sweep me off my feet. She just smiled in that annoyingly calm manner of her and said I was in for a surprise - and I happen to hate surprises. But if someone had told me back then that I - the self-professed Agent-hater - would not only be 'reincarnated' as an Agent but also fall in love with one...well I'd probably have shot that someone.  
  
So, like I said I'm a stubborn bitch and I refused to just let fate do its work, watching as my entire crew was slaughtered by Agents. Ha. Agents, my foot. They never laid a hand on my crew. But, how was I to know that fate loved surprises?  
  
The mission had been a routine one really. I'd gone to the Oracle with Merc, while Karma and Shock checked out a potential crew member. After my talk with the Oracle, I didn't tell Merc what she'd told me and he didn't ask. Having reached our exit, we found Karma and Shock already there. Their mission had gone without a hitch. No Agents or anything. That and the Oracle's warning made me antsy. But, I thought, 'Hell, why invite trouble? Maybe for once she's be wrong.' Yeah right. Soon after Merc and I got in, Karma's cellphone rang. Now, why the hell would our operator call Karma instead of Merc or me? Simple. He didn't.  
  
I really should have known that someone as cynical and bitter as Karma would turn traitor on us. He showed all the signs but I ignored them. Stupid, stupid, stupid. But that's why things screw up, right? Because someone does something stupid and this time, I was the one with an L on her forehead.  
  
So, before I know it. Karma takes out his gun, shoots Shock - poor kid was only sixteen, and goes for Merc. Merc managed to avoid getting shot in the chest, but still caught the bullet in his arm. Before Karma could get another shot out, I was next to him and kicked his gun out of his hand. I took great satisfaction in punching him in the face and kneeing him before I slammed him against the wall. With a firm grip on his collar, I held him up as he gasped for breath, his legs dangling inches above the ground.  
  
"What did they pay you?"  
  
"They're going...to re...reinsert me..."  
  
"Not if I can help it, you bloody traitor."  
  
I unexpectedly let go, causing him to fall to the ground with a thud in an ungraceful heap. I pulled out my gun and aimed it at his head.  
  
"They're...going to...kill you...kill you all..."   
  
The loud report of my gun cut him off before he could continue. I stared down at his half-crazed, lifeless eyes before Merc's firm grip on my arm jerked me back to reality. Merc and I slipped out the window and into the crowded streets just seconds before the Agents arrived. We asked our operator for another exit and got one in the waterfront district. A deserted warehouse. We managed not to attract any unwanted attention despite Merc's heavily bleeding arm. Although we did bump into an Agent, we managed to lose him and got to the warehouse in one piece. Everything was going to be fine. Or so I thought.   
  
The phone started to ring and I made Merc go first. He made it through. Then, it was my turn. The phone rang. I picked it up. Then, of course, a damn Agent just had to appear out of nowhere and shoot it right out of my hand. I barely managed to leap aside to avoid the bullet.   
  
I dodged before another bullet could nail me in the chest, then rolled to the ground to avoid yet another bullet. I quickly got back on my feet and was at his side in a flash. I aimed a high kick for his face, but in the process got my other foot kicked out from under me. I fell to the ground, but somersaulted backwards before he could get to me.   
  
The fight went on pretty much the same after that. Him attacking, me defending. Him winning, me losing. Then, he finally got tired of playing around and threw me against the wall. I landed on the floor with a sickening thud, unable to get up. I glared at the bastard as I tried to reach my gun just inches away. Of course, he kicked it away before I could get it. I swear I wanted to kill the damn bastard. I now wish that I remembered enough to do just that when I worked by his side. Damn Smith.  
  
He pulled out his Desert Eagle and pressed the cold metal on my forehead.  
  
I wondered, 'Why the hell haven't they just unplugged me already?' I later found out that my crew was too busy dealing with the Sentinels to do so. Lack of a proper radar and EMP made us defenseless in the face of the new enemy created to deal with us in the real world.  
  
Before he could shoot me, he paused to listen to the System's intructions. Then, I was knocked unconcious and the next thing I remember was being in their office. They'd somehow managed to fix my RSI and insisted on interrogating me.   
  
Smith, the bloody bastard, was blunt and brutal. Surprise, surprise. My entire crew was dead. The Sentinels had taken care of them and the ship. But, they'd also been ordered to keep my body in a safe place while I was interrogated. The Agents wanted what they've always wanted - the codes of Zion. Back then, the codes were known to both the captain and the second-in-command. Of course, the Agents knew that I was the latter and that with Merc dead I was their only chance.  
  
But, things didn't go as they'd planned.   
  
Fortunately, I had the presence of mind as well as the skill to develop Mnemosyne. Named after the Greek personification of memory, the code would wipe out the memory bank of a person under interrogation by the System. I'd studied their interrogation process by reading the code of several Resistance members who'd undergone it. The code I'd developed was still in the experimental stage, so only I had it inserted in my own code. After the complete destruction of my ship, all my files were destroyed. So, no one would ever know about Mnemosyne.  
  
And after that...well, the rest as they say is history. 


End file.
